I Will Always Love the Gaga
by talewind
Summary: One-shot. After a particularly taxing case, Hetty contemplates her team and her tastes in tea and music. Inspired by 2x05, "Little Angels".
1. Chapter 1

**Author's note: **I'm sorry, I watched episode 2x05 and this plot bunny was just _there_, ripe for the picking! I just had to indulge myself; the mental image was too amusing. Enjoy! XD

* * *

It was the end of another long day, another long case. Hetty Lange quietly observed her team members as they packed up to go home . Hetty was careful, though. Being who she was, she couldn't afford to appear too interested. Instead, she dropped a tea bag into her fine china cup full of hot water, hiding behind a wall of aloofness. She was Henrietta Lange, after all; that was how she operated.

Besides, the blackmail opportunities could be surprisingly rife if you could watch long enough without being noticed. It never ceased to amaze Hettie how quickly this could be forgotten.

She scanned the bullpen like a radar, watching for the slightest movement, when her eyes alighted on one scene. Marty Deeks seemed to be trying to...what was the term?..._hit on_ Kensi Blye, or at the very least impress her. Needless to say, the scruffy LAPD liaison was having little to no success. Speaking of, Ms. Blye seemed to have a natural talent for rolling her eyes.

Hetty moved along. There was nothing of interest there. She quickly refocused her ever-seeing eyes subtly on her other two agents. To those unacquainted with G. Callen and Sam Hanna, one might initially mistake their inside joke references and verbal tete-a-tetes for conspicuous homosexual flirtations. Of course, it was nothing of the sort-only the aforementioned inside jokes and verbal jousts. (Hetty liked jousting...hm...perhaps something she could do over the weekend?) Even she herself, however, could see where such misconceptions could stem from.

Hetty sniffed disdainfully. _Still_ nothing very interesting. Couldn't she find something _before_ they all turned in for the night?

_...Oh? What have we here...?_

Eric Beal, the resident tech operator had just recently flown the coop to return to his apartment...leaving a not-too-happy Nell Jones to finish taking care of the mess of equipment and data he'd left behind. Hetty would have to speak with Mr. Beal about that in the morning, along with the matter of his surfboard and the scratches and sand that always seemed to wind up on her car. Nobody else's!

The operations manager sighed, taking another long drink of her tea. As efficient and otherwise excellent as her hand-picked undercover team was, they could be surprisingly _boring_.

Suddenly a shadow loomed over Hetty-not an extra-ordinary occurrence in and of itself, but this particular shadow had a name (sort of).

"Hey, Hetty," G Callen said casually. "The team's going out for drinks tonight. You're invited. Wanna come?"

Hetty placed a finger daintily in the air as she took one more sip of her tea. Callen waited. Hetty took her time. Callen waited some more.

Finally she set the teacup gently on her desk. "I'm sorry, Mr. Callen. I have other...business, shall we say, to attend to tonight. Perhaps some other time?"

Callen raised an eyebrow and looked at her intently. Hetty knew that look. It was that infernal "I-know-you're-lying-and-or-not-telling-the-whole-truth-but-I'm-going-to-let-it-slide-and-find-out-sooner-or-later" look of his.

Hetty calmly met the head agent's gaze, despite the growing frustration in her mind. They just looked at each other for at least a half a minute more before Callen caved. "All right, then," he said, the suspicion evident in his tone of voice.

"All right."

Callen sighed and strode back to the other agents, waiting at the door. "So, who's buying?" he wondered aloud.

Deeks gasped. "Nose goes!" he shouted, immediately flinging his finger to his face. Kensi groaned.

"Just for that," she told him playfully, "_you're_ buying."

There was a murmur of general agreement from the others as they walked outside. Deeks just stood there for a moment, thinking, before something in his mind finally whirred to life and something clicked.

"...Hey! No fair! Wait for me!"

Hetty facepalmed.

Then, she realized:

Everyone was finally _gone_.

A smirk played around Hetty's lips. Glancing around furtively to make absolutely _certain _that nobody was left in or around the bullpen, she slipped a remote from a hidden drawer in her desk and hit the play button.

Music started blaring from the speakers in the spacious area. Throwing dignity to the wind, Hetty sang along.

_Rah, rah, rah-ah-ah_

_Roma, roma-ma_

_Ga, ga, ooh-la-la_

_Want your bad romance_

Hetty was well into the song and, bluntly, rocking out, when she caught a movement in the corner of her eye. She froze and slowly turned her head to face the intruder, pausing the music as she did so.

A janitor, mop in hand, was staring at her slack-jawed in utter shock. Henrietta Lang was singing and dancing to _Lady Gaga_!

Hetty cleared her throat, regathering as much of her dignity as she could. "You..." she said in a strained voice. "...are to speak of this to _no one_."

The janitor nodded dumbly.

Hetty forced a smile. "Very well. You may carry on."

The janitor blinked heavily before nodding, looking very much as though he'd awakened from a trace.

Hetty sighed and slumped back into her plush spinny chair. With her luck, the entire OSP office would know of the full details by the next morning, assuming they were all sober enough by then.

_Note to self: Check and delete security footage _first thing_ in the morning..._

~Fin~


	2. OH SNAP A KINDASEQUEL?

**ryu's corner**: Yes, by popular(?) demand, here is a new chapter! Two days have passed, and Hetty is content to know that no one knows what she and the sole janitor know. However, can things stay this way, or is Hetty's integrity before the OSP team forever doomed? Read on...

Oh, and massive brownie points to whoever notices the reference to another NCIS:LA fic that's AMAZINGLY AWESOMETASTIC. *less-than-three*

**disclaimer: **Nope, don't own NCIS: Los Angeles...

* * *

Two days later, Hetty Lange was once more being swallowed by the overwhelming mountain of plush that was her spinny-chair.

Nobody knew. All was well.

If they had known, Hetty would _obviously _know that they knew. All day, they would have been sharing covert glances, whispering in hushed tones, and being unnaturally polite around her, all while trying to stifle smiles.

Considering that the OSP team had gotten dead drunk the other night and still hadn't quite recovered, Hetty was quite content to be sipping at a mug of herbal tea. Why on _earth _she had even considered a teabag that day was far beyond her grasp. She shuddered at the very memory...

"Ugh," Deeks groaned as he staggered into the bullpen-late, as usual, Hetty noted grimly. "Worst. Day. _Ever_."

There was a murmur of general consent from the three other pre-assembled team members.

"Spoiler alert," Callen called out. "It gets worse."

"Um, what do you-"

Deeks' eyes bulged nearly out of their sockets. Sitting on his desk was the most enormous stack of paperwork he had ever seen.

He rubbed his eyes and yes, it was still there. Hetty hid a smirk behind her mug of tea.

"Wow," he finally managed. "Who knew paperwork could breed like _that_?"

"You get used to it after a while," Kensi offered half-heartedly.

"...But that doesn't mean it gets any easier," Sam sighed.

Deeks seemed not to hear them, still stunned by the sheer size of the pile. "We didn't get it like this at the PD station."

Hetty's cellphone started vibrating madly, and she gave it an odd look. After a moment she picked it up and slid it in her pocket. She cleared her throat.

"Mr. Deeks," she said pointedly. "Federal agents have far more expected of them than ordinary PD officers, no offense. So, as a liaison for NCIS, more _will _be expected from you. Don't get comfortable.

"Now if you'll excuse me," Hetty added. "There seems to be an important call coming in from the director. Would it be too much to ask that you keep the volume down to a dull roar, please?"

An assortment of "No, ma'am"s followed the request. "Good."

With that taken care of, she picked up her tea and left.

"...Pssst!"

The team gave a collective jump. "Eric! Don't do that!"

Eric seemed to ignore the request. "Is Hetty gone?" he faux-whispered.

Kensi rolled her eyes. "_Yes_, Eric. What's so important that you need to scare four _armed federal agents_?"

Nell's head appeared from around the corner as Eric shrank back. "Well," she said, an impish smile on her face. "Eric found an..._interesting _anomaly in the security camera footage last night."

Callen groaned and stood wearily from his desk. "Fine," he grumbled. "We're on our way..."

"...Well?"

Eric was just standing in front of one of the giant screens in the Eagles' Nest, tablet in hand, beaming uncontrollably.

"Okay, who gave him caffeinated gum again?" Sam demanded.

Eric seemed to snap out of his trance. "Someone has caffeinated gum?" he asked eagerly.

"_No_, Eric," Callen interrupted, glaring. "But we _do_ have federal issue guns, varying levels of hangovers, and _very little patience_. So, if you have something to show us, _now _would be the time."

Eric bowed his head meekly. "Okay..." Almost immediately, though, he bounced back up. "Okay! So, I was just reviewing last night's security tapes like I usually do in the morning, and I found something really weird! Someone deleted the security footage from about 2300 to 2345!"

A pause. Then, "And you brought us up here just to tell us that?" came from a very irritable Kensi.

"No wait, there's more!" Eric insisted.

His face fell suddenly when Nell plucked the tablet from his grasp. "Alrighty then," she declared. "_Somebody _had a little too much sugar in their Cocoa Puffs this morning, so I'll take it from here."

"But, Nell," Eric whined. "I found it first! Finders, keepers!"

"And you didn't keep your attention span long enough to focus on it. Losers, weepers.

"Anyway," she continued. "Because we're a federal agency and we're naturally paranoid and all that jazz, Eric developed a program to have all security camera footage in this building fed directly to his laptop in real time."

"So, we know what happened during that forty-five minute period?" Deeks verified.

"Exactly," Nell smirked. "And I'm putting it up on the big screen..._now_!"

With a slide of her finger, Nell dragged the video on the tablet and flung it up onto the big screen, where it started to play.

They were not prepared.

The team immediately recognized the tune that was blaring in the background-Lady Gaga's "Bad Romance", in all its creepy weirdness. The team immediately recognized Hetty, positioned in the middle of the bullpen. It took only a moment for their alcohol-soaked brains to make the connection between the two.

Deeks, surprisingly, was the first one to react. He doubled over in a loud, wheezy laugh. "Ohmigod!" he barely managed. "She's...it's..."

Kensi was doing her best to stifle her own laugh. Her best wasn't enough. She involuntarily snorted, which only caused Deeks to laugh even harder, and finally cracked open Sam's stoic mask. Only Callen was able to keep himself from laughing, but a wide, almost wolfish grin had spread across his face. He just shook his head repeatedly.

"That's not even the end," Eric interjected, and his finger hovered briefly over the fast-forward button on his remote...

"It is for you, Mr. Beal."

Everyone fell silent immediately, froze, and then slowly looked down. Standing in the doorway to the Eagles' Nest was Hetty herself, and she was not pleased in the slightest.

"My office, Mr. Beal. _Now_," she said curtly. If Eric had been a dog, his tail would have been tucked between his legs as he scampered out the door.

"As for the rest of you..." Hetty added grimly. "This. Never. Happened." To prove her point, she slid her finger across her throat menacingly before following after Eric.

The entire room was eerily silent for no less than ten seconds before Deeks suddenly burst into another fit of raucous laughter.

"It's so funny! ...Because she... Gaga...!"

Shooting the liaison wary glances, the rest of the team filed out of the room in single file. This event would certainly never be spoken of again.

...Well, at least, not in the office.

"...Hey...guys, wait! Where are you going? Wait up!"

~_fin_~


End file.
